Not quite as empty as he’d like to be.
Creative Staff
Story/Art: Yuji Kaku
What They Say
The series focuses on Gabimaru, once exalted as the strongest ninja, but who has now quit his trade, violating the laws of his village. After being captured, he claims he has nothing left to live for. However, due to his superhuman levels of training, he has inadvertently survived multiple executions, from attempts at beheading to burning at the stake. The executioner Sagiri Asaemon tells him that he has a lingering attachment to life, and issues him a mission to win his acquittal: to find the elixir of immortality.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Viz Media’s got a new series that kicked off earlier this year available on their site under the free section with this work from Yuji Kaku. The opening chapter is a 67-page piece with a single color page that sets up a pretty interesting premise, one that could work well if it doesn’t hook into the usual drawn out elements that populates so much manga. Kaku’s storytelling isn’t exactly disjointed here with the opening piece but it’s a matter of telling a tale with a couple of points of view before settling on the reality a bit. The result is slightly troublesome to get into at first but with some solid artwork throughout it and some amusing aspects to the storytelling by the lead in play it worked pretty well overall.
The primary character here is Gabimaru, a highly skilled and talented ninja from the Iwagakure village. There’s tales of ninjas from there that drink the elixir of life and are unkillable and that becomes clear here. He’s been captured by the government and they’re working through various attempts to execute him for his crimes. This is amusing as we see the ways he can be executed and how poorly they work while the record keeper, a young woman named Yamada, begins to notice that despite his indications that he wants to die he actually sets things in motion just enough to survive. There’s that sense of real immortality here but it’s somewhat unclear as to how much is a tall tale added to a man who has a significant body count behind him.
There are two intriguing aspects to all of this as it plays out. The first is that he wanted out of a marriage to the daughter of the chief who he describes as dimmer than dimmer. That’s not the truth and the two seem to have quite the bond, which may be what’s keeping him alive as he wants to do right by her. That’s something that Yamada is able to take advantage of as she’s able to offer through the shogunate a complete pass on everything that he’s done to the point where his former village won’t be able to touch him. The trick? Yamada wants him to join a group she’s put together to go to “the other side”, a place that’s been discovered that may have something truly wonderful. The downside is that nobody has returned alive and those that do return seem to be turned into half-flowers. Those two things are just enough to keep Gabimaru interested in staying alive.
In Summary:
Hell’s Paradise has some interesting ideas to it and I’ll admit that the reveal toward the end reminded me of the Annihilation novel a lot from the Southern Reach work. Yuji Kaku has some very strong stuff here and I’m curious to see if a normal-length chapter will flow better with a tighter design to it. The structure here is a little awkward but it covers a lot of ground and setup so that it can move forward. I’m definitely going to check out more if it’s in the free section but I’m wary of it falling into the usual manga storytelling traps.
Content Grade: B
Art Grade: B+
Age Rating: 16+
Released By: Viz Media
Release Date: May 17th, 2018
MSRP: Free
